


Give Me Steel

by Manticker



Series: Pathbreaker [1]
Category: Wraeththu - Storm Constantine
Genre: Anal Sex, Androgynes, Androgyny, Blood, Boot Worship, Cannibalism, Cigar, Corporal Punishment, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Domination, Foot Fetish, Gloves, Impregnation, Leather, Other, Piss, Sadism, Smoking, Squirting, non-binary, pelki
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-27
Updated: 2021-01-27
Packaged: 2021-03-13 09:40:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29026623
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Manticker/pseuds/Manticker
Summary: Summary: After a heated war council, Terzian and Ponclast retire to the archon’s chambers. Terzian expects to keep arguing against the Kakkahaar alliance. Ponclast has other ideas.Disclaimer: All characters property of Storm ConstantineSpoilers: Bewitchments of Love and HateTitle taken from the song "Big Brother" by David Bowie.
Relationships: Ponclast/Terzian
Series: Pathbreaker [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2174013
Kudos: 8





	1. Silence

**Author's Note:**

> Anyone mistaking this fic for an endorsement of Varr ideology or its real world analog, fascism, has not understood. If you want to know why I wrote this, look up Pier Paolo Pasolini's reasons for making "Salo." This is an exorcism.

No matter the season, the air inside the tower of Fulminir always seemed ten degrees colder than the outdoors. Inside Ponclast’s suite it was chillier still. Terzian was glad for the drop in temperature. The hours spent in the stifling war room had left him sweaty and flushed, as had his rage.

He walked in ahead of Ponclast, backwards through the door, turned to keep arguing.

“—it’s unthinkable,” he was saying, “Unacceptable! The Kakkahaar are effete, degenerate. Totally untrustworthy and a bad influence on our hara. We don’t need them getting softened up with foreign ways—”

Ponclast was silent, impassive, as he shut the door firmly behind him. Terzian was red in the face, pacing and gesticulating, half his hair standing up where he’d scrunched it in frustration, the collar of his shirt unbuttoned. Ponclast, by contrast, could have been carved out of ice. He was as neat five hours later as he’d been when the meeting started. His burr of cropped black hair was unmussed—it was too short to get disarranged. His cuffs and collar were buttoned down to the wrist and up to the throat, leather gloves immaculate, no skin at all showing beneath his pale, cold face. His back was straight, his features composed, and his eyes, chips of flint.

“—Against everything we stand for, everything we’ve fought for,” Terzian continued to rail. He was dimly aware that he was repeating himself at this point. He’d tried every argument he had already. The only thing left to do was to reiterate them more loudly.

“Over the desk,” Ponclast said, very softly.

Terzian stopped mid-sentence, staring. “What?” The archon had spoken so quietly that he hadn’t made out the words, yet the very sound of Ponclast’s voice, no matter how muted, demanded silence. Such was his power.

“Over the desk,” Ponclast repeated. His voice was still low, but every syllable was articulated.

Terzian stood frozen, gawping, not understanding. Ponclast made a crisp, impatient motion with a leather-gloved hand.

“You heard me, Terzian, and I think you understand,” he said, a little more loudly. “Bend over my desk.”

It seemed hardly possible for Terzian’s angry flush to deepen, but deepen it did. “Tiahaar!” he objected.

Ponclast began to walk forward, slowly, each step ringing as his hobnailed boots struck the uncarpeted floor. He reached up to undo the top button of his shirt, exposing a whole extra inch of throat. From anyhar else, it would be hardly even a suggestive gesture—yet performed by the icy Ponclast, it was shockingly lewd.

“Of course, you resent this order,” he said laconically. “But you don’t have the courage to defy me, Terzian.”

No extra note of threat in these words. There didn’t need to be. Terzian was Varr, and he knew what that meant. The price of his lordly power was submission to his leader. He’d just never expected that submission to come in this form. Still, he did not move. It was not courage that made him pause. He was simply frozen between conflicting fears of Ponclast—what he would do if Terzian resisted, versus what he would do if he obeyed.

Ponclast seemed to apprehend this. His mouth twisted dryly in what amounted to less than half a smile. He had reached Terzian now, and stopped directly before him, very close, practically toe to toe. Grey eyes stared into blue, and cool breath hit a hot face.

“I am in an excellent mood,” Ponclast remarked. “I got my way in the war council—quicker than I’d expected, if I’m honest. You are the one thing that threatens to spoil my temper.” He tilted up his chin and looked down his nose at Terzian. “Last chance,” he said. “Unzip my fly.”

Terzian was shaking with fury and terror. For a moment he wasn’t sure which would prove stronger. He wanted to strike Ponclast, to lay him out cold on the floor for his insulting proposition. But just now, he didn’t seem to have the strength in his arms; and besides, he wasn’t ready to live with the consequences of such an action. So, after a moment, he reached out and, with a curt gesture, yanked down zipper pull.

“Good.” Ponclast sounded amused. “Take it out.”

Terzian was nearly nauseous with suppressed rage as he obeyed. A detached part of his mind noted how strangely easy this was. It was nothing like stripping Cobweb, sometimes struggling to fumble him out of the delicate, feminine, confounding things he wore, resisting the urge to rip flimsy material rather than waste time fiddling with tiny clasps, hooks, and laces. Ponclast and he wore the same uniform. Ponclast’s had more insignia, but the fly was identical. He even wore the same standard-issue undergarments, as Terzian soon discovered. The equipment, too, was the same. Every har had one. It was disquietingly hard already, warm beneath Terzian’s touch. He freed it as efficiently as possible, then pulled away immediately, as if from touching a hot pan.

“To your knees,” Ponclast ordered.

It had been inevitable, yet the order still shocked Terzian. He raised his eyes to Ponclast’s, his face pleading—he had not wanted to show him fear, Ag dammit, but at this point what could he do but plead, if only silently?

Ponclast was expressionless, no pity at all in his gaze.

“This bores me,” he said. For a moment, hope flared in Terzian. Perhaps Ponclast meant he was tired of the whole perverse game, that he had proven his point, that he felt no further need to flex his power, save, perhaps, to force Terzian to zip him up again. Hope was short lived. It died with the next words. “From now on, you’ll be demoted by one rank every time I have to repeat an order.”

 _Demotion._ Terzian would have liked a swift death better. He dropped to his knees.

The ouana-lim stared him in the face. It reminded Terzian of some monstrous creature, a lamprey perhaps. His mouth had gone dry. That would be a problem, for what he had to do. He had done it before, though it had been ages ago. He’d been Uigenna then, kneeling, as now, before his leader. His vestigial Adam’s apple bobbed as he struggled to bring up some saliva.

Ponclast gripped the base of his ‘lim and smacked it lightly against Terzian’s cheek. The head was leaking. It left a trail of wetness along the har’s jawline. “You know what to do,” said the archon from above.

Blood pounding in his head, Terzian opened his lips, and took the heated flesh into his mouth.

Ponclast leaned back against the desk, gloved fingers gripping the edge, eyes lightly closed. At first he was passive, allowing Terzian to work. The har was out of practice, but he knew what he was doing. He enjoyed receiving such attentions himself. He knew well enough what felt good. Ponclast made not a single sound even as Terzian’s tongue swept ‘round the swollen head. His breath did not so much as quicken. In a few moments, he shifted his hips, driving deeper into Terzian’s throat. Terzian gagged and choked. A ghost of a smile touched Ponclast’s lips. He took hold of Terzian’s hair in one gloved fist and began to thrust.

Terzian struggled to breathe, and to not lose his lunch. Each long, vicious thrust brought up a flood of saliva, and soon slobber was running down his face. The convulsions of his unwilling throat made his eyes water, and soon his nose was running too. It was utterly humiliating.

Worse, he could feel himself becoming soume, something that had not happened to him in years. The orifice he kept firmly sealed and tucked away between closed legs was beginning to open, to slicken. Soon it would be just as wet and sloppy as his face. The retreat of his ouana-lim was even more shameful. Terzian had never quite got over thinking of it as his “manhood,” if not precisely in those words, since he was not a man. He looked on human maleness with contempt, but his disgust for femaleness was a thousand times stronger. He was a warrior. He bore his ouana-lim like a weapon. To feel it sheathe itself within his body cavity was to feel surrender and defeat.

Yet even in his misery, there was something about all this that made him feel strangely secure. Inside his mind, his thoughts had quieted. After all, the worst had happened—was happening—and there was nothing to worry about, now. He had no arguments to make, no agenda to pursue. There was only the will of Ponclast. All he had to do was comply. He was just following orders, respecting the chain of command. In a way, it was the easiest thing in the world.

Ponclast’s enjoyment was the keener for his silence and restraint. He neither groaned nor shivered, gave no vent to his pleasure through sound or motion. All of it was contained within him, building in his body. He thought of it as powder tightly packed.

He endured Terzian’s clumsy suction for a moment more, then placed his booted foot on the other har’s chest and pushed him away.

Terzian fell back, half-sprawling on the floor. He looked up at Ponclast, eyes full of dread, but lips parted lewdly in unwilling desire.

“The desk,” said Ponclast crisply.

Terzian struggled to his feet and complied. The smooth wood of the desk was cool and dry beneath his sweaty palms, and the polished surface misted slightly around his hands.

“Drop trou,” came the order.

Terzian, still half-bent at the waist, fumbled with belt, button and fly. Eventually he managed to horse the leather uniform trousers down his hips. It was the hardest thing he had ever done, but noncompliance was not an option. The scent of his own feminine organ seemed to flood the room, salty and swampy and cloying. The embarrassment was overpowering, yet it prompted a fresh gush of fluid from between his legs. He hung his head and tightly shut his eyes.

“Spread,” he heard Ponclast order in a deadly whisper.

His thighs nearly stuck together, so prolific was his lubrication. He couldn’t spread his legs very far, half-imprisoned as they still were in the stiff trousers, but it was enough.

Ponclast made a small noise of appreciation, a soft “hm” which in another context might have sounded merely thoughtful. Terzian heard the hiss of leather on leather as a belt slid through belt-loops, and he stiffened. Shades of his human father, nearly forgotten, rose from the tomb of memory.

“Don’t scream.” The words were barely audible. Terzian had to strain to hear. He supposed this was the game, now—he must listen extra carefully so as not to miss a whispered order and suffer the penalty of demotion.

“Yes, Lordra,” he said clearly, to make it known that the command was received.

He nearly yelped anyway, for Ponclast struck before he was even done speaking. A stripe of red-hot pain blossomed across Terzian’s ass. He clenched his teeth and sucked in his breath, holding it in with his scream. If he couldn’t get out of this with his dignity intact, he damn well planned to preserve his rank.

Ponclast smirked cynically at Terzian’s stoicism. He paused to pour himself a drink, and sipped it while he watched the perfectly placed welt on Terzian’s rump rise and change colors. Setting his empty glass aside, he took up the belt again and snapped it against itself. The very sound made Terzian’s shoulders jerk, and Ponclast’s ‘lim throbbed with satisfaction.

“The only noise I want to hear,” he said, “is the music this makes on your flesh.”

Terzian’s fists curled on the desk. He nodded. The last time he’d had a belting, he’d bawled. But he’d been a boy then, young and only human, after all. He could endure. He _must_ endure.

Ponclast raised the strap of leather, saw it gleam in the light and admired its wicked sheen. Then he swung it down with all his might. _SMACK!_ Terzian staggered, and made a nearly inaudible choking sound in the back of his throat. Ponclast gave no quarter, but struck again, viciously laying another angry stripe across Terzian’s backside. The more he suffered, the harder Ponclast would get.

Soon, tears were pouring down Terzian’s face. He had no power to hold them back, but he kept them silent. The pain was terrible, but after a few strokes, the endorphins started to kick in. Not endorphins, he supposed—surely harrish bodies released even more efficient chemicals to deal with pain. It felt different, certainly—stronger, more euphoric, a warmth spreading throughout him. The pain that had oppressed him began to set him free of himself. His shoulders straightened; his head lifted. Unconsciously, he arched, pushing his ass back to eagerly meet the punishment.

Ponclast saw, and understood. He was amused to discover that Terzian was a masochist, though he was hardly surprised. He’d always had his suspicions about Terzian. His tastes in hara ran to the vaguely terrifying—from his witch of a consort to that little bit of Uigenna rough trade he’d recently taken up with. But neither of them could give Terzian what he needed, not really. Terzian craved a leader, a master, a father. That could only be his archon.

He dealt a few more lashes with the belt, then laid it aside. Terzian was enjoying it too much. It was hardly a punishment anymore. Ponclast stepped up close behind the other har, so that their skins didn’t quite touch but their body heats mingled. He reached for a small bottle of oil on the desk, and used it to slicken his shaft. Terzian looked sideways at the bottle as Ponclast put it back down again, thinking, despite himself, that they would hardly need it. Its necessity was explained a moment later as Ponclast pressed the head of his ouana-lim, not at the entrance of Terzian’s soume-lam, but against the tight pucker of his asshole.

Terzian gasped in fear and threw up his head. “No, Lordra,” he gasped. “Please, no.”

It was precisely the reaction that Ponclast had wanted.

“I’m going to fuck you like a hume boy,” he said. “You don’t deserve to get rooned like a har.”

Terzian had thought he’d come to the end of fear, but now he found fear was a bottomless pit and that he was free-falling. “Lordra,” he said hoarsely, “Please, let me atone some other way. Demote me. Strip me of all caste. I don’t care. Just please, please don’t—”

Ponclast laughed, and thrust into Terzian in a swift, brutal motion. His victim’s words were cut off by a stifled cry of agony. Ponclast closed his eyes and ran his gloved hands down Terzian’s hips as he rested inside him, relishing the feeling of the unwilling hole clenched around him.

“Nonsense,” he said. “I don’t want to demote you. I need you in command, and close to me. But from now on, _this_ is what that means.”

Terzian was shaking uncontrollably, impaled on Ponclast’s member. It hurt like a knife, and he was terrified that Ponclast’s thrusts would feel like twisting in a wound. His neglected soume-lam was so wet and open, so ag-damn ready, that it nearly hurt on its own. He’d never been aroused like this. At that realization, his eyes shivered closed in submission, blond lashes brushing his cheeks.

Ponclast spread his booted feet into a wider stance, adjusted his grip on Terzian’s hips, and then began to thrust. He did it slowly at first, with gloating malice, relishing every inch that he forced into Terzian, every squirm and twitch and desperate gasp of pain. But soon, this languid pace became agonizing even to him, as his need for release built. Surrendering to his own desire, he began to pound away briskly.

Terzian had started to whimper, a high, keening whine. Ponclast paused to slap him in the face.

“Shut up,” he said sharply. “I don’t want to hear those fucking noises. You’re a warrior still.”

Terzian subsided, biting down on his own fist to stifle the sounds. It felt like Ponclast was tearing him apart. He’d been sodomized before, back when he was a hume, though not often, and never like this. An ouana-lim is quite different from a cock. It has too much texture for such a delicate orifice. Terzian was certain he would bleed later, if he wasn’t already. Yet there was pleasure to it as well. He discovered that quite suddenly as Ponclast shifted his angle and hit something that sent sharp pangs of ecstasy shooting through Terzian’s body. He flung up his head and bit back a yell. It seemed that along with their other specialized anatomy, hara had received upgraded prostates as well.

Ponclast felt Terzian’s insides clench on him, and, realizing what was happening, redoubled his attack. In a few short moments he came violently, breath hissing and hips jerking convulsively. His climax sent Terzian over the edge as well. Not daring to scream, he clenched his teeth so hard he thought they’d shatter, and pounded his fist on the desk to endure the harsh thrill that swept through his body.

In the moments after, he collapsed limply on the desk, sprawling face-down in official papers, his nose inches from an ink pot. He was tingling all over, as he had after his first kill. Ponclast’s ouana-lim was softening inside him, and soon slipped out between his cheeks. He felt bereft without it.

“Thank you, archon,” he managed at last.

Ponclast emitted a dry laugh. “I did not do it as a favor,” he said, voice thick with scorn.

Terzian’s shame was fathoms deep, yet somehow, he wanted to wallow in it forever.

“Is there anything else you require, Lordra?” He couldn’t keep the hope from his voice.

“Your support for our alliance with the Kakkahaar,” Ponclast coldly replied.

“Granted.” Unbelievably, this submission hurt worst of all, but he gave it. Still, he did not stand, or move to pull up his trousers.

“By Ag,” Ponclast sounded excessively diverted, “you _want_ more abuse.”

‘Need’ might have been a more accurate word for the insistent pulse between Terzian’s legs. Eyes down, he nodded. He could feel Ponclast’s stare on his back, could sense his speculative regard. He waited, hoping against hope.

“Very well,” Ponclast said. “Stay just as you are. I’m going to wash up, have a drink and a cigar. If you remain still and wait, perhaps I’ll use you again.”

His boots rang on the floor as he retreated, making for the cold, white-tiled bathroom of his suite.

Terzian stayed leaning on the desk, listening to the shower run, watching the shadows lengthen around him as the evening gloom descended upon Ponclast’s chamber. It was still cold, even colder now, and he was beginning to get a cramp in his leg. But for the first time in his life, Terzian felt that he was where he belonged.


	2. Disgust

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Terzian wanted more.

At long last, the shower turned off. The bathroom door opened, emitting a warm billow of steam, and Terzian heard Ponclast emerge. He dared not turn his head, as much as he wanted to. He must stay still. He was exhausted from holding the awkward position for so long, but he’d been given an order.

He heard Ponclast pause in the middle of the room, as if looking him over. Then the soft, catlike padding of his bare feet resumed, so different from the ringing stride of his boots. Terzian heard him settle into an armchair on the far side of his room, listened to the sounds of liquid sloshing from a bottle, and a match being struck. The stench of cigar smoke reached him. 

Then he heard Ponclast snap his fingers, and give the sharp order: “Strip.”

Terzian gritted his teeth and complied. He undressed quickly, but took the time to carefully fold each article of clothing and place them on the desk in a neat pile. He was incapable of irreverence towards his uniform, and besides, he was keenly aware that treating it in a cavalier manner would displease Ponclast.

He had eagerly awaited the archon’s return, had ached for his coming. Yet now that Ponclast was back, Terzian felt ambivalence returning in the form of doubt, guilt, and creeping resentment.

Ponclast watched Terzian strip, his drink balanced carelessly on his cupped hand. It gave him a certain muted pleasure to see the military precision with which his subordinate disrobed. Not too much pleasure—Terzian was beneath him, as was everything else in his world. It would not do to let himself be overly affected.

He had made himself Master of all he surveyed. Fulminir and everyhar in it belonged to him. To Ponclast, Terzian was merely the most troublesome of his possessions.

He knew Terzian felt uneasy in his presence. It reminded him of the bargain he’d made, the pact of obedience. Back in Galhea, his little kingdom, Terzian was lord. He looked upon all others there in the way Ponclast was currently looking at him. He had his consort, his son, and that hot little piece of ‘lam, Cal, living with them. What sadistic pleasure Terzian must take in forcing Cobweb to tolerate the presence of a rival! To walk silently past the bedroom door behind which the moans of another har could be heard—that was the greatest sign of submission that Terzian could desire, the sharpest cruelty he could inflict.

Ponclast smirked. Terzian lacked imagination. In his place, he could’ve done much worse.

Here in Fulminir, the Varrish seat of power, Terzian was not king. He was reminded of the ones above him, whose existence he could blissfully forget in Galhea. Of these, the most galling was Ponclast himself—the source and the negation of Terzian’s power, both licenser and sole possessor of his brutality.

Terzian was a problem because part of him wanted to sit where Ponclast sat—or was convinced that he _should_ want to, anyway. But Ponclast had known him for years, and all that time, Terzian had only ever been a tool of other hara’s designs. He had the constitution of a born follower, an excellent second-in-command. Despite his delusions to the contrary, he lacked the capacities of a leader.

 _I must break him,_ Ponclast decided. _He knows as well as I do that the strong dominate the weak. If I crush him, make him feel his inferiority beneath me, he will not be able to rise up. His only consolation will be to crush those under him, in my service._ His lips curved gently at the thought.

Decided, he roused himself from his reverie and focused on the har before him. Now fully nude, Terzian stood at attention by the desk. His back was still to the archon. He had not been told to turn. Ponclast feasted his eyes on the lines and angles of Terzian’s straight spine, his strong shoulders, his lifted chin. It was the stance of a soldier—the stance of a slave.

Ponclast set his tumbler down with a clink on the table beside him, and lifted his smoldering cigar from the marble ash tray.

“Come here,” he ordered.

Terzian was uncertain how to obey. Should he execute a crisp about-face and forward march? It would be too ridiculous, he felt, naked as he was, and it might even read as irreverent. But to abandon his military posture felt equally wrong. He settled for turning carefully and approaching with a measured step, not relaxing his spine.

He saw Ponclast sprawled on the red leather armchair, cigar between his teeth. To Terzian’s disappointment, the archon was not naked, but wrapped in an immaculately white waffle-knit bathrobe of the spa type. His feet were bare, his legs visible to just below the knee. It was still far more flesh than he’d ever seen Ponclast expose. The bare feet seemed especially provocative. Terzian had never thought that feet, of all things, could be erotic. Yet now, he couldn’t help imagining how perfectly the arch of Ponclast’s foot would fit over the back of his own neck. The thought weakened him in ways for which he could not have been prepared. Unbidden, he dropped to his knees before the archon. Slowly, almost against his will, he bent forward until his brow pressed against the cold floor.

Ponclast’s ‘lim twitched at the sight of Terzian prostrate before him. Not even he had expected such prompt submission. It was almost disappointing. He sensed what Terzian wanted him to do, and pondered whether he should indulge his subordinate’s distasteful desire.

 _What the hell,_ he thought, and put up his feet.

Terzian shivered. There it was, the arch of the foot cradling the back of his neck, a caress more intoxicating than any lover’s hand. The weight of it made his forehead press more firmly against the floor. A soft sigh escaped his lips.

Ponclast heard, but did not comment. At the moment, Terzian was just furniture. Any sound he made now warranted no more remark than a creaky bedspring. He leaned back and closed his eyes lightly, and spent several minutes nursing his drink and his cigar, savoring the smooth smoke and smoother liquor. At length he opened his eyes and saw his ash had grown long. He set his feet back on the floor.

“Up,” he commanded, and Terzian obediently lifted his head. His eyes were so blue. Within them simmered a cocktail of loathing and devotion. _Pathetic,_ Ponclast thought, _if flattering._

“Wet your mouth,” he said.

Terzian nervously licked his lips, not understanding. Ponclast impatiently clarified:

“Bring up some saliva, as if you were about to suck me. You don’t want your mouth to be dry.”

Terzian flushed again and shook his head. His mouth had started to water at the mere words. He dragged some more spittle up from the back of his throat just the same.

Ponclast leaned forward, his cigar inclining dangerously towards Terzian’s face. To his credit, the har barely flinched.

“Open,” Ponclast commanded.

Terzian understood now, all too well. His heart racing, he obeyed. Ponclast leaned even closer and flicked his ash onto Terzian’s waiting tongue. Terzian heard a soft hiss from within his own mouth as the hot embers hit mucous. Ponclast’s instructions had been merciful. They had saved him getting burnt. He shivered at the thought.

Ponclast sat back, pleased. The glowing cherry of his cigar reflected in Terzian’s wide eyes as the har knelt there uncertainly, his gaping mouth still full of ashes.

“Swallow,” Ponclast ordered.

Terzian obeyed. The ashes were hard to get down, and the taste they left was far from pleasant. Outrage and shame thrummed through him, but they no longer urged him to defiance. Instead, the dark emotions lulled him like a bellyful of hot sheh. He felt drugged.

“Go put on a record,” he heard Ponclast say, from what seemed quite far away. “The one on the table.”

Dreamily, Terzian rose and complied. His soume-lam had been oozing again, and his thighs were stickier than ever from it. He found the record on the table indicated, beside a gramophone. The record was old, from the before times—no har had been able to record music, much less press vinyl, since the collapse—but the turntable and the ornate horn-type amplifier were new. These relatively primitive technologies that had been easier to recreate than some others that were more recent. It must have cost a fortune, even so. Only the archon of the Varr could boast such possessions.

The ghostly strains of a string orchestra floated from the machine. Ponclast sank back into his chair to let the noise wash over him, conducting with a single finger. It was Brahms, the Hungarian Dances. Ponclast supposed he should’ve liked Wagner, but he didn’t. The Ride of the Valkyries was alright, but the rest was pretentious crap. It bored him. Brahms wrote real music. It was stormy and painful, but also beautiful, like the half-formed thoughts and fleeting passions that chased themselves through Ponclast’s mind on the rare occasions when he let himself relax. When he listened to Brahms, was as if he could let the music think and feel for him.

Terzian hesitated by the turntable. He wasn’t sure where he was supposed to be. As if reading his thoughts—perhaps he had—Ponclast recalled him with a curt summons. Terzian went to kneel before him again.

Ponclast observed him with amusement. Terzian’s gaze was downcast, his palms resting on his knees, his heels tucked beneath him. His nipples were hard in the chilly room, and there was a tremor in his lean shoulders. His soume-lam reeked. Ponclast inhaled the bouquet of his arousal, and exhaled cigar smoke.

“You want to kiss my feet,” he said. It wasn’t a question or even an accusation, just a statement of fact.

Eyes still down, Terzian nodded. “Yes, Lordra.” His voice was a mere whisper.

“Then do it,” said Ponclast coldly.

Terzian burned with humiliation and desire. He bent his head and pressed his lips gently, shyly, to the tops of Ponclast’s graceful feet, first one and then the other. His feet seemed as smooth and as cold as the marble beneath them. It was like kissing the feet of a statue—a grave marker perhaps, or an idol of stone. There was no odor to them at all, save for a faint lingering smell of soap.

In this act of abasement, Terzian lost himself. He kissed them again and again, growing drunk with adoration, nearly swooning in bliss when Ponclast lifted a foot from the floor to give him access to the sole. With lips and tongue, he worshipped the toes, the arch, the shape of the ankle bone, the curve of the heel.

“So devoted,” Ponclast sneered. “You’d do anything for me.”

Terzian stopped abruptly, his head jerking up. Ponclast’s tone was like a dash of ice water. It snapped Terzian out of his lust-trance, reminding him of where he was and what he doing. What was wrong with him? He’d never acted like this, not with any har. He didn’t even _like_ Ponclast, not really.

“I’d do anything for Varr, Lordra,” he corrected stiffly.

“Look.” Ponclast snapped his fingers to draw Terzian’s gaze up to his face. The blue eyes glared, and glistened with standing water, but they could not look away. Ponclast stared down into them, skewering Terzian with his look.

“You’d do anything for _me_ ,” Ponclast repeated.

Terzian knew it was true. The way Ponclast was looking at him made him feel like a bug on a pin.

“You are Varr, Lordra,” he conceded.

Ponclast smiled, then—a smile thin and wintry, but a smile nonetheless. He knew he had won.

“Yes,” he said. 

He reached into Terzian’s mind. It was easy. He’d had psychic training with the Kakkahaar. Terzian had no occult experience of any kind, and besides, his mind was not strong. His will was Ponclast’s for the taking. Ponclast imagined it as a fragile thing, a pale flower. His own will was a clenched fist. He plucked the flower.

With a strangled cry, Terzian fell backwards onto the floor. A flash of light had come before his eyes. For a moment he thought he’d had some kind of seizure. He tried to rise, but he felt himself pinned down by an invisible force. It held his limbs and body motionless, and pressed down on his chest and throat with suffocating weight.

 _Spread._ The command was not spoken aloud, but it rang through his mind. Though Terzian could not have moved a muscle on his own, he felt his legs snap apart.

Ponclast stood and shed the bathrobe at last. He smirked down at Terzian, who lay spread-eagled on the floor, his eyes wide with fear and fury. A vein was twitching in his forehead, and there was a spasm in his jaw as if he were struggling to speak. His soume-lam, lewdly gaping between his splayed legs, was sloppy with viscous fluids.

Ponclast should’ve been instantly ouana at the very sight, yet somehow the image failed to move him. His ‘lim was only semi-hard and partially extended. Perhaps the mental effort of holding Terzian down was interfering with his potency. The thought made him testy. He was not a strong psych yet. It had been stupid of him to try to show off. Now he was in danger of looking foolish.

He knelt between Terzian’s legs, massaging his own shaft, trying to coax out the reticent organ. Several seconds of trying had no effect. In fact, his ‘lim began to retreat. In frustration, he snapped out his fist and punched Terzian, hard, in the thigh. The choked noise of pain that Terzian made through sealed lips prompted a bit more interest from Ponclast’s nether regions. He hit him again, this time in the belly. Had he been free to move, Terzian would’ve curled fetal from the pain. Tears leaked from the corners of his eyes and ran down his face. Seeing that was just enough for Ponclast. He lowered himself onto Terzian’s helpless body and shoved inside.

Terzian wanted to groan or scream in bliss. He wanted to raise his hips to meet the thrusts, to seat Ponclast deeper within him. He finally had what he’d so desperately needed—the archon’s phallus buried in his wet, aching hole. But he could do nothing. Not even his internal muscles seemed to be under his control—when he clenched on Ponclast’s shaft, it was through no effort of his own, either conscious or unconscious. The rhythmic squeezing was dictated by Ponclast’s will, not his. At that realization, something deep within him broke. It was a pleasurable breaking. His spirit stooped and took the yoke. For Terzian, the moment was perfect.

It should have been perfect for Ponclast as well. He saw Terzian’s rapturous submission, and knew his triumph was complete. He had enslaved this har, body and soul, now and for all time. But Ponclast had been broken too—long ago, but by a similar method. His spirit had not shattered in the same place as Terzian’s, but he was broken just the same; and now nothing that smacked of willingness could please him. Terzian’s adoration left him cold. Ponclast needed his pain, his terror, his hate. He wanted to take and pillage and conquer, not receive.

 _Here I am, the worst of degenerates,_ Ponclast thought bitterly, _an imposter atop a pile of fools._

The violence of his own self-loathing rekindled his weakening fire. He leaned down over Terzian until they were body to body, smooth hard chests pressed flush against each other. He grabbed a fistful of Terzian’s hair, and unthinkingly mashed his mouth to his, teeth bruising lips and tongues tangling, breaths colliding like volatile compounds.

In those breaths, in that moment, both saw:

Ponclast saw Terzian’s home, Cobweb’s face with eyes of accusation, his love grown cold through disillusion and betrayal. He saw beautiful Calanthe, not Terzian’s bitch but his tormentor, Ponclast now perceived—by Ag, Terzian had not so much as _had_ him yet! He saw the harling Terzian barely knew, and sometimes doubted was his own. We Dwell In Forever, the famous house with the fanciful name, was a petty kingdom built on hubris and lies.

This much Ponclast saw, that Terzian would not have wished him to see, but Terzian saw more and worse—the nightmare scene that always must repeat in Ponclast’s mind, day and night, whether he walked or rode or sat or slept, but most of all when he took aruna. The handsome leering face of a big blond har, leaning forward, spitting epithets. Tearing pain. Orgasms ripped from an unwilling body, spiced with despair and shame, rewiring a soul to resonate forevermore only to the key of force—

Ponclast tore himself away and rolled onto the floor, gasping. _Not that. Terzian must not see that._ Black fury descended over Ponclast as he realized that, in the memory of his own violation, he was finally fully hard. The taste of self-disgust was sour as vomit. His fist lashed out again, connecting with the side of Terzian’s skull. The impact split his knuckles, but it felt good. He did it again, striking viciously as if he could batter the truth out of Terzian’s mind.

Terzian cried out as his head snapped from side to side, sickening lights exploding in his brain. He realized dimly that he was no longer held by supernatural bondage, but there was no strength in him to resist Ponclast’s onslaught. His mouth filled with the metallic tang of blood, and a hot sticky flood poured from his nose.

“Mercy, Lordra,” he gasped, hands held up feebly in a gesture of appeal.

Begging was unsoldierly. It should have made Ponclast savage with disdain—and did—but it also aroused him. He threw himself on top of Terzian again, pressing his forearm across the other har’s throat. With his other hand—a hand sticky with their mingled blood—he thrust his fingers deep into the gaping, hungry cunt. Should he think of it as a cunt? Surely not. It was the anatomy of a har, not a human female. But right now, Ponclast didn’t care a toss about the difference. A hole was a hole.

Terzian yelled and arched as Ponclast’s cruelly probing fingertips found the first sikra. He hoped ardently that Ponclast didn’t still want him to be quiet, because he couldn’t. It would be impossible now. He’d never felt anything like the painfully focused pleasure that throbbed in him at Ponclast’s fingertips.

“Feel that?” Ponclast hissed in his ear. “There are seven of these inside your ‘lam. Anyhar ever played with them before?”

Terzian whimpered and shook his head. His whole body was trembling violently. Ponclast grinned down at him with barred teeth, between which flecks of saliva glittered. There was murder in his eyes. His icy composure had fully cracked, and what lay beneath was an inferno. It was terrifying. Terzian wanted it to consume him.

Ponclast could feel that the sikra had hardened, a little flesh nub rising amid the slickness inside. He moved his fingers deeper, probing for the next one. Terzian shrieked and bucked again when he found it.

“Here is the secret of harrish reproduction,” Ponclast breathed. “They thought a harling could only be conceived in love. Fools. It has nothing to do with any such sentiments. It’s all perfectly mechanical.”

Terzian jerked, gasping like a hooked fish. Panic washed over him at Ponclast’s words, but he was helpless in his pleasure. The archon’s hand had disappeared in him to the wrist. It twisted, and another nerve blazed to life.

“Lordra, no,” Terzian panted. “Please, no…”

Ponclast continued to monologue as if he had not heard. “The only trick is to open the sikra, one after another. It’s quite simple once you know how. And you open so easily, Terzian.” Condescension dripped from his voice. “Breeding a brat from you will be no trouble at all.”

Not even in his worst nightmares had Terzian dreamed of such degradation. He opened his mouth to protest, but what came out instead was a shriek of ecstasy as Ponclast curled his fingers relentlessly towards his pubic bone. A flood of liquid gushed from between his legs.

“Did you ever make a girl squirt?” Ponclast asked conversationally as Terzian shuddered and panted beneath him. “It’s not so different.”

Quite abruptly, he yanked his hand out. He wasn’t gentle. It hurt. Involuntarily, Terzian curled toward the center of his pain. Ponclast wiped his wet hand on Terzian’s hair, then pushed him flat onto his back again. He was aiming his ‘lim once more. This time, it was throbbingly erect. Terzian’s eyes went wide at the sight, and a puff of breath that sounded like “please” escaped between his parted lips.

Ponclast laughed sharply, and impaled Terzian in a long stroke like the thrust of a sword.

Terzian threw back his head, his mouth shaping a soundless “o.” The sensation was exquisite as Ponclast’s shaft slid against each of the aching sikra. The head, thrust deep, seemed to pierce something at the core of him. It was the seventh sikra, the seventh seal. The last of his defenses. Terzian sobbed with wild delight as it gave way. He wrapped his arms and legs around Ponclast, clinging to his narrow hips, his strong back, as he broke for him again.

Ponclast felt Terzian’s soume waters gushing over him once more, soaking his skin. He felt the strong muscles tugging at his shaft, the tight hole swallowing it eagerly. At long last, he let himself be swept away by the heat of aruna. He bit down on Terzian’s shoulder, relishing the feeling of firm muscle under smooth flesh, the salty taste of sweat. His nails dug into Terzian’s skin as his thrusts grew quick and brutal, became animal rutting without finesse.

“I could breed you now,” he mumbled against the side of Terzian’s neck, with a flick of his tongue. “And you’d enjoy it.”

Terzian imagined going home to Cobweb and Cal carrying Ponclast’s pearl. There could be no greater humiliation. He tried to envision ways to play it with dignity— “I am chosen carry the archon’s son. No other har was strong enough.” Even in his mind, it sounded laughable. No matter what glorious gloss he tried to put on it, everyhar who looked at him would see him as he was now—on his back, legs spread, about to be bred like a bitch. He’d be a laughingstock, an object of scorn. Yet the thought of such disgrace made him bite his lip and moan, and caused his hole to spasm greedily around Ponclast’s ‘lim.

“If you so will it, Lordra,” he breathed, despising himself.

Ponclast’s hand closed, vicelike, around his throat.

“You’re mine,” he grated. “Say it.”

Terzian felt as if he stood on the brink of a cliff. He closed his eyes, and in his mind, leaned forward into the fall.

“Yes, Lordra,” he choked.

Ponclast’s hand tightened, cutting off Terzian’s words with his breath. His hips slammed violently against Terzian, driving his ouana-lim into that deep, secret place, now open—the cauldron of creation. He felt himself on the brink. Should he do it? His only son, Gahrazel, was effeminate and possibly disloyal. Terzian could bear him a real heir, a strong one. He was sure of it.

But no, it must not be. In Varr there are hostlings and there are warriors, and no one is in between. Terzian must stay a soldier. Besides, he wanted Ponclast’s pearl too much. It was frankly distasteful.

With a cry, Ponclast ripped himself from Terzian’s body. He was barely in time. The aren spewed forth, a hot shower splattering Terzian’s chest, some even hitting him in the face. As the surprised har lay, there gasping and trying to blink stinging jism from his eyes, Ponclast shoved his hand back inside the gulping soume-lam and finished Terzian with a few expert jerks of his curled fingers. Terzian’s cunt—Ponclast had given up thinking of it as anything else, of _him_ as anything else—produced another torrent. He whimpered hoarsely through the orgasm, struggling against the throes of his own body, a part of him unwilling to the bitter end.

At last, Terzian subsided and lay still. Ponclast yanked out his sopping hand and shook the liquid from it. There was silence in the room. The record had come to its end long ago, though it still spun without sound. 

Ponclast got unsteadily to his feet. He knew Terzian wanted to be held, but he wouldn’t indulge such weakness. He stood over his conquest, straddling his body, and looked down with blazing eyes at the har that was his. Terzian was beautiful, that much was true—square jaw, straight nose, hard body. The only feminine things about him were the full, pink lips on his face and between his legs. A perfect little soldier. A perfect little slave. What, after all, was the difference?

Something almost like tenderness stirred in Ponclast’s heart, but it was seasoned with contempt—contempt for the har who made him feel, yes, but still greater contempt towards himself for feeling.

Terzian stared up at him through tears, which were only one of a variety of fluids with which he was smeared. His lips were parted, his body limp. He couldn’t stop shaking. His gaze was that of a beaten but still adoring cur. He feasted his eyes at last on Ponclast’s nude body—lean ridges of torso, a deep muscular v leading down to his ouana-lim. It was hard to imagine him ever being soume. Yet Terzian had seen. Ponclast probably hated that he had seen, but it did not diminish the archon in Terzian’s eyes. Nothing could. Ponclast stood above all, including his own past. His secret, wounded feminine side only made Terzian long to take up arms for him, to ride forth for his glory and honor.

Ponclast watched Terzian falling in love with him, and his lips twisted with disdain. His ‘lim was soft now, so he could do something he’d been needing to do for a while. He gave into the pressure in his bladder.

Terzian was silent as the stream of piss rained down on him, though he did twitch a little. He closed his eyes in meek acceptance of this further degradation and did not wince even when Ponclast adjusted his aim to soak his face and hair. The urine stung the contusions on his cheek, nose and lip.

The stream at last subsided. Ponclast shook off his ‘lim. It was good that the floor was bare. Somehar could clean up the puddle later. He turned dismissively away, plucked his discarded robe from the armchair, and wasted no time in wrapping it around himself.

“Clean that up,” he commanded, “Then clean yourself up. Afterwards, we’ll talk.”


	3. Blood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Terzian is a boiled frog.

After his shower, Terzian surveyed himself in the clouded bathroom mirror. He didn’t look different, which was odd. He felt as though he should. Surely what he’d been through must show somehow. He leaned closer to the glass, scanning his face, his body, for any new, tell-tale signs of femininity. Of course his jaw was as square and heavy as it had ever been, his body as firm and muscular, his blue eyes just as steely. Even the cuts and bruises on his face looked acceptably masculine, as if they’d been acquired in a fair fight. _You really can’t tell._ At the thought, his shoulders relaxed. _No one has to know._

He finished toweling himself dry, then drew a deep breath, braced himself, and stepped from the bathroom.

Ponclast sprawled on a leather divan, boots up. He was formally clothed for dinner, in a perfectly tailored dress uniform. He was nursing another cigar and reading an old book. He didn’t look up when Terzian came in.

Terzian stopped in the doorway and watched him awhile, drinking in every detail of his image. Despite his resolutely male demeanor, Ponclast had a delicate beauty. His face, long and finely drawn, had the austere loveliness of a female saint—Joan of Arc, perhaps, with that cropped hair. His hands, not yet sheathed in their customary gloves, were long and graceful, and his lips were like pale rose petals. Terzian had never really noticed his beauty before—it was forbidden to notice, treacherous to contemplate. Ponclast was not an object to be seen, but a voice to be heard, a will to be obeyed.

Words came unbidden to Terzian’s mind: _none shall see my face and live._ He wasn’t sure where that was from, but it seemed to fit.

He jumped when Ponclast spoke, not having thought his return had been noticed. 

“Get dressed.”

Terzian obeyed. Putting on the uniform felt different than it had before—more like putting on a servant’s livery than girding himself in a warrior’s gear. The tight leather hugged his limbs like bondage, and cupped his crotch like a lewd hand. Once this attire had made him feel powerful; now it made him feel owned. Yet still, it compelled him to straighten his spine and hold his head a little higher.

Ponclast finally looked up, snapping shut his book. A faint, enigmatic smile played about his lips.

“Well, Terzian,” he said, “I think we’ve come to a better understanding.”

Terzian nodded tightly. “Yes, Lordra.”

Ponclast laughed—a musical, seductive laugh, almost like that of a beautiful woman.

“At ease,” he said, and Terzian shifted automatically into the more relaxed stance. Ponclast looked him over, eyes glittering with dark merriment.

“You will dine with me,” he said. “The table has been laid.”

He rose, setting his cigar aside to smolder, and stretched, feline in his tight black clothes. The casual gesture tugged at Terzian’s heartstrings. It seemed that Ponclast remained somewhat melted. Terzian had not expected that. He’d thought the walls would come back up, and the frozen façade rise again. That would have made things easier. If Ponclast had closed up, had acted as if nothing had happened, Terzian would’ve been able to pretend as well. He could’ve walked out of here and put it from his mind. But a little warmth lingered, like smoldering embers, and Terzian could not help but be drawn to it.

“Come,” Ponclast commanded, and sauntered from the room.

Terzian followed him into the next chamber of the suite, which was a small dining room. The table was intimately set for two. The place settings were the finest spoils of human civilization—delicate china plates, silver cutlery, glasses of shining crystal, scarlet table linens. No food had yet been set out. Black candles burned in antique brass holders cast in the shape of satyrs.

“I suppose we’re early,” Ponclast remarked. Instead of seating himself in one of the high-backed chairs, he drifted over to a liquor cabinet. “Drink?” he asked.

Terzian nodded, and followed him over.

Ponclast looked him in the eyes, faintly smiling yet somehow quite serious. “Give me your hand,” he said.

_To shake like friends?_ Terzian, touched despite himself, complied.

Ponclast gripped his fingers and pressed them firmly, holding his eyes. Terzian caught the flash of steel in his peripheral vision, but didn’t have time to process it before a fiery line of pain slashed across his wrist. He hissed through his teeth and tried to pull away, but Ponclast held him fast. Looking down, he saw his blood dripping into a crystal tumbler. The sight, and perhaps the blood loss, made him feel dizzy. When the cup was half-full Ponclast chuckled and released him.

“Put pressure on that,” he advised, nonchalantly handing Terzian a napkin.

He raised the cup of blood as if in toast, then knocked it back. Terzian stared at the archon in shock, thinking he’d gone quite mad.

Ponclast smiled as he licked the scarlet from his lips. “Now for yours,” he said.

Without so much as wincing, he made a cut on his own wrist and dripped the crimson into a second tumbler. He offered the sanguine shot to Terzian with an arched brow. His smile dared him to refuse. 

Terzian blanched, looking down at the gory contents of the cup, which had already started to congeal. He thought of blood bonds, the holiest kind of union there could be between two hara. This was a marriage, in a way, though neither of them said it—a profane and blasphemous marriage, but a marriage nonetheless.

_Will you take this har, Terzian, to be your lawful Master? To love, honor and obey, until death do you part?_

He raised his eyes to meet the challenge in Ponclast’s gaze.

“To your health, Lordra,” he said softly, lifting the glass.

He drained it to the last drop. Ponclast’s blood tasted sweet and metallic, as blood should, but it seemed to burn going down his throat. He recalled the infusion that had made him har. This was like a second inception, in a way. The archon’s essence would change him. Ponclast would always be inside him now. It felt frightening, final—and right.

Ponclast watched Terzian drink and marked well his thirst. _He can’t get enough of me._ Smirking, he offered the other har his still bleeding wrist. Terzian took it, first shyly, then boldly, pressing his lips to the wound, lewdly tonguing the gash, and eagerly sucking the blood. The power of Ponclast’s essence overwhelmed him. He went to his knees as he continued to drink, faint with ecstasy.

That was how the house-har found them. The servant cleared his throat awkwardly as he entered, pushing a cart laden with covered platters.

“Come in, Greeva,” Ponclast said coolly. 

The house-har, to his credit, did not hesitate further, but puttered around quite calmly setting the table. Terzian, mortified to have a servant witness his degradation, tried to get to his feet. Ponclast shoved on the top of his head, pushing him back to his knees. Only when the house-har had left, shutting the door softly behind him, did Ponclast allow Terzian to rise.

“Sit,” he said, as if to a dog, and took his seat at the head of the table. Terzian settled himself at the archon’s right hand—his natural place.

Ponclast lifted the lid off the covered platter before him. Terzian followed suit, then started at the sight. On a bed of tender greens, studded with pomegranate seeds, lay a hunk of raw, bloody meat. It appeared to be an organ. Its shape was horribly familiar. Some kind of dark sauce was drizzled artistically over it in a zig-zag pattern.

Ponclast was already cutting into his own. He lifted a morsel to his mouth with a silver fork, and chewed with evident relish, his eyes lightly closed in pleasure.

“What is it, Lordra?” Terzian asked, though he already knew.

Ponclast’s eyes opened, and gazed upon Terzian with cruel amusement.

“It’s a human heart,” he said. “Very fresh. Quite the delicacy. Go on,” he urged, when Terzian hesitated. “Eat up. You’re not squeamish, are you?”

Terzian looked down at the elegantly plated atrocity, and swallowed hard. He’d never eaten raw meat. The fist-sized chunk lying before him didn’t look much different than a harrish heart, and he’d seen a few. Something very like this beat in his own chest—an uncomfortable thought. He looked up at Ponclast, who was nonchalantly enjoying his grisly meal. It may as well have been his own heart that the archon feasted on.

He _was_ squeamish, by Ag, and embarrassed about it. After all, why should he be? He’d slaughtered hundreds of humes. There was no logical reason why this should be too much for him. Yet the prospect was viscerally repellent—viscerally, viscera, a choice of words far too apt. He tried to think of the heavy metal posters, the gory movies and bloody videogames of his boyhood. It helped, but only a little.

Was this the final threshold, the point of no return? No, he realized, he’d passed that hours ago. The rasp of a zipper had sealed this deal. Even from that moment, it had been too late. Now he must go wherever Ponclast led.

“No, Lordra,” he said at last, and took up his carving knife and fork. He sliced off a morsel of bleeding flesh. He placed it in his mouth. It had been marinated in something—lemon and olive oil, salt and pepper. It was surprisingly delicious.

Ponclast watched him with a satisfaction that was both quiet and vicious.

“How does it taste?” he inquired.

“Like victory, Lordra,” Terzian replied, and washed down the bite with a too hasty a gulp of wine.

Ponclast smiled to himself—knowing full well that if he’d shat on a plate, Terzian would’ve eaten that too, and said the same.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading. Since I know many people in the fandom have strong ideas about these characters, especially Terzian, I decided to write a little bit about why I interpreted them this way. 
> 
> Both Ponclast and Terzian are portrayed as being resolutely ouana at all times, yet we know they also take aruna together. Someone had to be soume. I choose to believe that Ponclast would preserve the chain of command by making Terzian be soume. Also, we know Terzian is eventually pressured by Ponclast into committing heinous sexual atrocities, such as what happens with Gahrazel. Terzian is not exactly a good person at the beginning of the books, but I believe that he wouldn't have done that sort of thing when we first meet him. He had to have his will and boundaries broken down by Ponclast somehow. This is part of how I imagine that might have happened. 
> 
> Terzian is portrayed as masculine, proud, glorious, in control. I know this makes him very sexually attractive as the ouana star of many a dark fic. But those qualities are illusory, part of the lie of fascism. Fascism promises to make its followers proud, glorious, strong, but instead leads them into total degradation and utter submission to the leader. This story is also a parable about that process. 
> 
> Ponclast, the leader, knows himself to be a fraud, as I believe such "glorious leaders" often do. He has nothing but contempt for his devotees because he ultimately has nothing but contempt for himself. 
> 
> I initially was inspired to write this after my family's business was targeted with alt-right propaganda being plastered all over the store front. Apparently I process intense fear through eroticism. I'm not proud. I finished this story after the goddamn storming of the Capitol. In between writing this, and self-soothing by re-reading "Bewitchments," I read a lot of anti-fascist theory by Wilhelm Reich, Julia Kristeva, Theodor Adorno and Susan Sontag. This is the result. You're welcome?


End file.
